I found Silver Cove MC and it is a cross platform semi vanilla SMP on 1.21.5 paper. They say you can join on any version higher than that too.
The whole point of this server is to avoid that boring two week phase. The owner talks a lot about listening to players and adding new stuff from community suggestions. They also run custom events often so there is usually something to do.
It also tries to stay fair. They say it will never be pay to win and they do not lock ranks behind money. Ranks can be earned for free if you keep playing and putting in the work.
It sounds like a classic Minecraft experience with only quality of life plugins. The community vibe is meant to be welcoming to everyone.
